Missing: One Brain

Apparently, if you have a baby, even if they baby doesn’t survive, you will have crazy stuff happen like not forgetting to turn off the stove, and not being able to concentrate, and when you think something is totally wrong with you, the doctors will all say, “It takes time to heal.”

Except it feels like forever. I lost the baby at the end of August, and even coming here, it said on the posts that it was four months ago. August was almost three months ago. I feel like I should be better. I feel like simple routines like closing the garage door when I go into the house should fall out my ear and disappear. I feel like I shouldn’t have to ask my phone to remind me of the simplest of tasks, just because I have Swiss cheese brain.

Yesterday, I had my thyroid checked due to some difficulties last year. I was actually hoping for a thyroid issue. My weight has increased drastically (in my opinion), despite food tracking. I forget everything. My train of thought is constantly derailed. I will start one task and go to another, then come back to the first task because I forgot or something. I had a few other symptoms of hypothyroidism. But after paying the $10 co-pay, the doctor told me he didn’t actually need to see me. I got the whole healing speech again. I think he agreed to test my levels just to humor me.

It’s bad enough I feel the underlying anger and hurt. Yesterday, we went to a restaurant, and my husband and I ended up sitting next to a baby. A baby that kept getting louder and louder, trying to get mom’s attention. We ended up leaving. We were that couple that just wanted to enjoy a meal, and why can’t people control their kids. And I totally understand family coming into town and you want to be out and chatting, and sure, the baby wasn’t crying, but still. We couldn’t help but discuss what we would have done differently. I think we are both angry. And I want to not feel angry. I want to feel normal again.

I want my brain back.

Me No Likey

Since I became pregnant, I am surprised by the foods and drinks I don’t like. Mostly because they are the foods and drinks I really use to enjoy. For example, I am completely turned off by:

• Bacon
• Chocolate 
• Tea
• Starbucks 
• Potatoes (except tater tots or potato chips)

It also is not recommended I have sushi or cold lunch meat, so to make up for it, I eat Will’s forbidden food – pizza. Carbs have been wonderful, especially in the beginning when eating made me queasy. We have been doing well with fruits and veggies also, but a lot of foods just depend on the day. I had a fish burger a few weeks ago, and when Will had one again, I ate a veggie cheese sandwich, which was fantastic. 

I generally feel not hungry most of the time. We eat depending on my mood, and sometimes I am just not in the mood for anything. I am told that will change. It makes it hard because Will depends on my appetite to decide what we eat. And if he suggests something, I turn my nose up. It is a no win situation for him. 

I am curious as to what’s ahead. 

Threatened Miscarriage

This post is a little TMI. If you came here because you are pregnant and bleeding, make sure you talk to your doctor. This is my own personal feelings on my situation. 

For over a month now, I have been in a state of threatened miscarriage/threatened abortion. I really thought pregnancy would be the end of tampons and pads, but for me, that has only been half true. I have bled through a pad a day since about June 5. My bleeding, which had been happening before and stopped for almost two weeks, before starting again, happened on my nephew’s tenth birthday. He probably won’t forget it, because he came to visit me in the Emergency Room. 

So far, things have been good though. The baby is moving and fine. Several ultrasounds have been done. It is business as usual, with the exception of what feels like a month long period where I can’t use tampons. I am taking pelvic rest very seriously. I even have started cutting the wings off my pads because they were giving me a rash. 

Of course, I turn to Dr. Google for reassurance, but if you are pregnant and bleeding, just go to the doctor. Dr. Google is nothing but bad news. You have a strange, rare pregnancy disease, you are having a miscarriage, some other worse case scenario. I felt a lot better just having the professionals tell me what was going on. And it isn’t like bleeding hasn’t ended up in heartbreak before. But this time, we are fine. Warning signs: bleeding through a pad every three hours (nope), cramping (nope), pain (nope). 

I think the bleeding will be done soon. I am looking forward to it. 

1st Trimester Thoughts

About two days ago, we announced publicly that we are expecting our first child in January. I have wanted to write about it, but have t on the off chance someone would come along and let the secret out. But now, the secret is out, and here are a few things I have experienced:

• Super Sniffer: I have always wanted children and read a lot about them, but I never knew that my sense of smell would increase so dramatically. It is like a strange super power where you can smell all the evils in the world. Yes, all of them – potatoes going bad about a week before my partner could smell it, the smelly storm drain from half way down the street, what’s that mystery smell?, something odd in my parents’ pantry that we never could pinpoint. 
• No Morning Sickness! Hooray for me, because many women get this. (Sorry, ladies that have it. No fun.) But I only get occasionally queasy, like seasickness, and a couple of handfuls of Cheerios quells the storm. (I also asked my boyfriend about mood swings, and he said he hadn’t noticed any – without fear in his eyes.)
• Lack of Appetite: I just haven’t been interested in eating. I thought Weight Watchers would be good portion control, but pregnancy has been even better. Except I am not any skinnier. The other thing about lack of appetite is that I am not interested at all in my favorite foods: bacon (blech), tea, chocolate (unless it covers something else, like fruit), fresh potatoes, French fries, turkey, fish, etc. 
• Weird Cravings: Things I don’t normally eat, I have been craving. Milkshakes, waffles (which I am normally not a fan of), potato chips, tater tots, fruit, beef hamburger (normally, I eat turkey). 
• Weight Redistribution: I haven’t lost weight, I haven’t gained weight, but everything seems to have moved to my middle. 
• Pain and Swelling: I have arthritis, but I thought pregnancy would help. Instead, I have been taking Tylenol, per the doctor and as needed. One of my feet has changed color slightly, and I am constantly swollen. Now my boyfriend makes me put up my feet when I get home, the jerk. (Kidding, kidding – he is super sweet.)

Speaking of my boyfriend, he has been super protective. I didn’t expect that until maybe the second trimester, but he was there from the beginning, which is what I always hoped for. Telling my parents was also a lot of fun, and I won’t forget the looks on their faces for a long time. I am not sure my nephew understands about being a cousin, but he will get there. He kind of has no choice. 

For now, I am just enjoying the moments. 

Thank You

If I was going to impart someone with any great wisdom, it would be to say thank you to someone in the service industry, after they have helped you. Someone once commented that I say thank you a lot. Well, maybe others don’t say it enough. 

For example, I just ordered a drink, it was made, I said “Thank you.” Others didn’t. Maybe they had something else on their mind. Maybe they felt like it was their job so why should they say anything. Personally, I think it is just polite. They aren’t your servant. They are people who get yelled at or berated by some people. I think a kind word goes a long way. 

Someone takes the time to show you styles of clothing, even if they didn’t work, thank them for their time. Thank the guy who fixed your car, even if it cost $700 to fix it. He gets a small percentage of that. Be kind. 

It just may make their day. 

Catherine

Today, as we were getting ready to drive to brunch for Will’s birthday, I took a quick look at Facebook. I saw RIP Catherine (the remainder of the post omitted), and thought it was the kind of joke that people play on each other. You know, Catherine said she died, and someone posted RIP Catherine as a status to tease her or something like that. Will had run into the house and when he came back, I explained what I saw and went to her best friend’s page to find that it was all true. She was ill over the weekend, and then suddenly she was gone. I am still trying to wrap my head around how this could happen, why this happened. All the angry, hurting questions we ask when someone way to young is taken from us.

But it felt appropriate to blog about it. Because Catherine blogged under a pseudonym and I passed by her blog now and then. I wasn’t a regular reader by any means, but I wish I had been because I lived in Indiana at the time, and she lived in Indiana, and it just would have been nice to have a friend in Indiana.

Instead, I met Catherine at a turning point in my life. I went to a blogger party, ConFab, and many people I had been wanting to meet were going to be there. She was with a group of other girls, and I don’t really remember talking much to people because my shyness kicked in. But everyone got a list of names, and we all became friends on Facebook. Catherine liked books, cats, and had many similar interests to me. I enjoyed many conversations with her. I always hoped to meet her again.

I feel to young to have friends start dying. Catherine was younger than me. And I feel like there will never be a satisfactory answer as why this happened. How could this happen? I feel for her family. I hope they get some answers.

I just hope she is at peace now.

What I Hate About My Fitbit

In March of 2012, I decided I needed to see how much walking I did, so I bought a Fitbit Ultra. It was pretty cool. It counted steps, miles, floors, and would monitor sleep. But after driving an hour and a half, and having the tracker count a hill I was driving on as a flight of stairs, and every bump in the road was a step, I decided it wasn’t for me. In addition, I had to pull out my computer to charge and upload my information.  So, I returned to the place I purchased it from – Best Buy.

After having unloaded the thing, I thought I was done with it. I didn’t disable the tracker from my account, because I didn’t know I had to do that. Once I discovered it, it was too late, because I didn’t have the tracker and base anymore, and I remember reading I needed that for the account. Then, I started gettin email notifications that I was earning badges. Without evening owning the Fitbit anymore, I got the Trail Shoe badge. I had never gone 30,000 steps when I owned the Fitbit.

But the mysterious information didn’t stop there. I also got the Canyon badge

I definitely didn’t climb 400 floors with my no longer my property Fitbit. And then, I got two lifetime achievements on top of that.

Okay, this person was superhuman or something. After barely having my Fitbit, either walked New Zealand and climbed the Sears Tower or they took a road trip then hopped a plane. Clearly, it wasn’t a big deal, because I returned my Fitbit. I was still thoroughly annoyed that Best Buy sold my Fitbit to someone else, and that the new purchaser didn’t set it up properly, though.

Then, in November 2013, I got my Fitbit Flex. I was super excited about it. So excited, that I didn’t really remember that I had information that wasn’t mine in the account. Then I realized, “Hey, this thing has badges” and went to look at mine, which were pretty much all filled up by the bionic person.

I contacted Fitbit, and they told me there was nothing I could do about this. I couldn’t delete information from my account. I explained to them that I did not take the steps, but that my Fitbit was sold to someone else after I returned it, and I wanted to have it be just MY information. I didn’t care if they got rid of the two weeks I had the Ultra.

They offered to make a new account for me. It would be starting the day I contacted them. I could do that myself. I asked them if one of their programmers/developers could fix my account. They said no. I decided to wait a little bit.

I contacted them a second time, and was told again that their was no way to delete information from my account. I was also told I could make those days travel days in the activity tracker. I did that.

The badges did not disappear.

So, this month I finally made my account mine again by making a new account. I just got the Marathon badge – Woot! Woot!

I lost the steps I have earned from November 2013 – December 2014, but I can live with a fresh start. And all my Fitbit buddies came to my new account, so I am happy about that. I actually feel a little more motivated now, then from having my old account be at a discrepancy due to the bionic person and their 80,000 extra steps in my account.

So, if I was going to change one thing about Fitbit, it would be to either allow customers to delete a day of activity, or have their developers/programmers/computer people work with a customer who has incorrect information in their account.

Otherwise, I love it.

Falling Apart

Two days before I got the flu, I went to the urgent care clinic for some breathing difficulties. Since then, I have:

• been diagnosed with sleep apnea and told to sleep on my side.
• had my fingers swell and unswell, then swell again.
• been walking like a zombie for The Walking Dead, because I had had so much pain from my ankylosing spondylitis.
• a swollen foot that turned out to be nothing
• lost a ton of sleep because of back pain from only sleeping on my side
• a large lump on my thyroid

I haven’t been able to walk properly for three week. It has been horrible.

As for the thyroid, the thought is that it is benign. However, since September I have had a feeling like there is a pill stuck in my throat, so I will have the option of having half my thyroid removed or feeling like a boulder is pressing against my windpipe. If it does turn out to be cancer, it will have to be removed.

Today, I finally felt like I was walking like a normal person. This is great! My finger swelling also hasn’t appeared for a few days. So, I finally feel like a normal person again. But tonight, to add insult to injury, I discovered something that makes me feel like my journey to normalcy is not quite over yet….

There is a zit in my nose. There is a zit IN MY NOSE.

Who gets zits inside their nose??

i will be resetting the countdown to normalcy.

Facebook Killed the WordPress Blog Star

Lately, I have noticed a trend. People on Facebook have been announcing that they are closing their blogs. This makes me a little bit sad.

The thing is, I too, have set aside my blogging. If I create a post, I may get one or two comments, or nothing, but I still go back to it, because though I write for an audience, I also write for myself. And it seems to be a lot harder to visit blogs, though I feel like the bad friend who needs to make more of an effort. The fact that almost everything is done through my phone now doesn’t really help. But honestly, I feel I have a love/hate thing with Facebook.

I love that I can connect with so many friends – people who I have met online over the years – and get little snippets of their lives.

I hate that a few short sentences have overtaken real blogging. Instead of telling a great story about how some lady at the mall backed into a light post and on the way out nearly takes out three pedestrians including yourself, it becomes “I was at the mall today. Some people should have their driver’s license taken away.”

I hate that if I put a status message up, I am sharing it with my family, my blog friends, that person from high school I haven’t seen in 20 years. Yes, I know I can change the permissions, but who has time for that? But sometimes, I want to say something to friends, but I don’t want mom to know. And I don’t trust Facebook’s privacy, which is a whole other things I hate about Facebook.

I also hate that I can’t just dump Facebook, because I would lose contact with so many people I really like.

I don’t post as often as I use to. It started with a few times every day, to once a day, to once in a while. But I can’t see getting rid of my blog anytime soon. There is so much history here – good and bad – and sometimes I just need a place to write it all out. Even if I only visit every six months or so. This blog is like that old friend you meet up with, and just pick up from where you left off, even if no one is reading anymore.

41

Last year, a friend of mine said to me that I won’t really be in my forties until I turn 41. According to her logic, this Sunday I will officially be in my forties.

I’ve kind of felt blah about it. In the past, I have been excited about my birthday. But this year, my boyfriend has asked me what I want to do, and I just don’t know. It sounds like he has been struggle with how to make it special, also.

Then today, I came home to a house full of balloons. And I got a little bit excited. At the very least, I will eat cake and be happy I survived another year!!

 

 

 

Last Sunday, we had an earthquake.  Hopefully, things won’t be as eventful this Sunday. All was well where I am at, but Napa was shaken, not stirred. I have talked with a few people who had damage. All in all, everyone seems to be okay, though.